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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Tennesseans Can Weigh In on Green-Card Policies

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Friday, October 12, 2018   

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – As they prepare to vote in the November midterms, Tennesseans can also weigh in on a proposal by the Trump administration to punish legal permanent residents who have used certain public benefits - by making it harder for them to get a green card or visa.

The proposal comes despite studies that show legal permanent residents use benefits such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) or Medicaid at rates similar to U.S. citizens.

The rule change appeared Wednesday in the Federal Register, which kicks off a 60-day public comment period on the website Regulations.gov.

Ben Monterroso, executive director of the Latino support group Mi Familia Vota sees the move as cruel.

"It's trying to continue the narrative that President Trump did that immigrants are bad people and freeloaders, lazy people and criminals,” he states. “It's another attack on the Latino community."

Monterroso points out that undocumented migrants aren't eligible for most kinds of public assistance.

The Department of Homeland Security says people who receive these types of aid should be declared a "public charge," which would count against them if they apply for a green card or visa.

The rule would also make it harder to get a green card for people who make less than $15,000 a year, regardless of whether they use public benefits.

Monterroso says he hopes voters will remember this issue in the November elections.

"They've been attacking the community expecting and hoping that the community's not going to defend themselves, but I think it's gone too far,” he states. “This is the time that we can use our power to elect people that actually respect the community and see us as part of the country, and not as strangers that can be disposable workers."

The move is part of a series of federal actions targeting the immigrant community, some of which are tied up in litigation, including termination of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Temporary Protected Status (TPS) programs, stepped up immigration raids, separating parents and children at the border and moves to end the policy that allows migrants to sponsor family members to come to the U.S.


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